Zone of Contamination Impressions

[hozz1235]

I've played for about 5 hours so far.

• Love the new howling wind sound in caves
• Love how harvested animals now visually show as “ravaged” and realistic!
• Love the mine interiors
• Finally found Miner’s Flashlight!
• Zone is so big!  One of my favorite parts of this game - just exploring new places
• So many new assets.  Glad to see just not recycling old.
• New music tracks are great!  One does kind of remind me of Stranger Things soundtrack though

More coming soon, I'm sure!

[Merrak]

I had the same issue with the Miner's Flashlight. I believe it just never spawned anywhere else in my game, because I checked ALL the possible locations and it was nowhere to be found.

[artmunki]

It's certainly a pretty challenging region, and so far it seems like the weather's bloody awful too - might even be worse than PV, and the glimmer fog seems like it might be more frequent than in FA. The region feels like it might be even bigger than FA, and it's gonna take a lot more exploring to get familiar with, but I it's always such a delight to get lost somewhere new in this game again. The mine itself is huge, and takes some time to get a grasp of the internal layout, same goes for the surrounding buildings. The new wolves are different enough to require a little getting used to, but not as weird as some folk seemed to be worrying about. Oh, and I already managed to get the poisoned affliction once (damn glimmer fog!), and unless I just didn't notice going hungry, I think it wipes out out well fed bonus too.

And I just found this ...

[twyn1]

Beautifully eerie & a bit disturbing region. The mine buildings are amazing & routes challenging to figure out, map wise, especially when dealing with bad weather.  I am enjoying the exploration so far, ran out of charcoal trying to get a handle on the layout.

Kind of lost on what exactly I'm supposed to be doing (typical for me) in the challenge. I want to search everything & find everything at the same time ... so I'm probably doing too much jumping around.

Have stashes of items all over and no idea how I'm going to consolidate them at some point because I don't know where to make a central base. Don't like "rooming" with corpses so a few promising places are not gonna work.

Been in the mine and have taken a cursory walk-around look -- I'm thinking spray paint may be my unsung hero. I definitely missed some important areas but am worried about not having enough respirator canisters.

The wolves are pitiful ... I honestly wish I was a better shot so I could put them out of their misery. Sad ...

Continue to not like the glimmer fog, alltho' it seems toned down a bit (the sound effects?) but it is still headache inducing. 

Very pleased overall-- great job Hinterland!

[Acthalla]

The enormity of everything is incredible.

I am similarly worried about the number of canisters.  I haven't started the Tale yet (I haven't completed part 1 on this save yet and wanted to jump right in the new zone), but after initially drowning in canisters I'm now worried about how many I might need for the tale.  I've explored a decent chunk of the mine.  I've found about 25 canisters and already used 10.

I did get Cabin Fever while inside the mine, which seems kinda odd to me.  I know the mine is "inside", but I'd been traveling extensively and hadn't stayed in the same place for longer than it took to sleep.  Given the size of the mine, it seems counter-intuitive for it to increase Cabin Fever as it curtails exploration.

[Enigmaecho]

1 hour ago, Acthalla said:

The enormity of everything is incredible.

I am similarly worried about the number of canisters.  I haven't started the Tale yet (I haven't completed part 1 on this save yet and wanted to jump right in the new zone), but after initially drowning in canisters I'm now worried about how many I might need for the tale.  I've explored a decent chunk of the mine.  I've found about 25 canisters and already used 10.

I did get Cabin Fever while inside the mine, which seems kinda odd to me.  I know the mine is "inside", but I'd been traveling extensively and hadn't stayed in the same place for longer than it took to sleep.  Given the size of the mine, it seems counter-intuitive for it to increase Cabin Fever as it curtails exploration.

I wanna say I killed about 13 canisters clearing looting and tale I have 9.5 left but while spending time in the mines I went through the effort to spray paint danger at the beginning and end of each gas zone and i didn’t run into one I couldn’t easily run through no mask in later testing (except maybe one long section I think around the 500 level) and if you panic there’s plenty of time to bring first aid up on the wheel and put on the mask in a hurry 👍 

cabin fever in the mine is a little odd I wonder if the cabin fever buff foods have any impact 

[Acthalla]

4 minutes ago, Enigmaecho said:

I wanna say I killed about 13 canisters clearing looting and tale I have 9.5 left but while spending time in the mines I went through the effort to spray paint danger at the beginning and end of each gas zone and i didn’t run into one I couldn’t easily run through no mask in later testing (except maybe one long section I think around the 500 level) and if you panic there’s plenty of time to bring first aid up on the wheel and put on the mask in a hurry 👍 

cabin fever in the mine is a little odd I wonder if the cabin fever buff foods have any impact 

I've found one area that is too long to run through, but good idea on the spray paint.  I've been using it to mark dead ends/areas I've cleared, but didn't think to mark fog zones.

 

I also did not realize you could equip the mask from the first aid menu, good to know!

[conanjaguar]

4 hours ago, artmunki said:

And I just found this ...

Creepy teddy bears seem to be a running gag at Hinterland . 

[Enigmaecho]

I’m definitely going to hang onto the rest and only use them in dire emergency no telling what perils the installation will bring (even if it brings some more canisters 😂)

[Enigmaecho]

3 minutes ago, conanjaguar said:

Creepy teddy bears seem to be a running gag at Hinterland . 

The one in omega is my snuggle buddy and I make the trip just to use that bed 😊

[Merrak]

Alright, time for my impressions:

• Level Design is top notch; from the overworld, to the mine, and even the scale/layout of the buildings are all fantastic!
• Aggressive wolves who are silent when they attempt to sneak up on you is a nice touch
• Story is mostly good, though the ending felt a little disappointing
  • The coughing of Will/Astrid when reading the note was of interest!
• As someone else pointed out, the harvested animals artwork looks great
• Cave mouths in the new zone, when viewed from the inside out, actually look like what is outside instead of generic rock formations
  • I really hope this continues throughout the game because it's a very nice touch
• Extra Sport Bow found in the zone leads me to believe this one may not just be a single unique item like the Woodwright's Bow
• New Afflictions should be detailed a bit more for players

[hozz1235]

I haven't even started the tale yet.  I haven't found the respirator either but I have managed to explore all of level 3 of the mine (working level 2 now).  It appears you can dash through the gas zones (similar to BR Mine).  Yes, I have used spraypaint extensively for helping to mark out the mine.  Huge underground complex!!

I also found the 2nd Sports Bow.

Edited December 8, 2023 by hozz1235

[Enigmaecho]

10 hours ago, Merrak said:

Alright, time for my impressions:

• Level Design is top notch; from the overworld, to the mine, and even the scale/layout of the buildings are all fantastic!
• Aggressive wolves who are silent when they attempt to sneak up on you is a nice touch
• Story is mostly good, though the ending felt a little disappointing
  • The coughing of Will/Astrid when reading the note was of interest!
• As someone else pointed out, the harvested animals artwork looks great
• Cave mouths in the new zone, when viewed from the inside out, actually look like what is outside instead of generic rock formations
  • I really hope this continues throughout the game because it's a very nice touch
• Extra Sport Bow found in the zone leads me to believe this one may not just be a single unique item like the Woodwright's Bow
• New Afflictions should be detailed a bit more for players

Where’d you find a sport bow?

I found a miners flashlight and I’m over to moon! Just need the foresters revolver that didn’t make it on my existing and I’ll have it all but I’d love another sport bow 

[Merrak]

28 minutes ago, Enigmaecho said:

Where’d you find a sport bow?

I found a miners flashlight and I’m over to moon! Just need the foresters revolver that didn’t make it on my existing and I’ll have it all but I’d love another sport bow 

The Sport Bow was down in the Mine. I can't remember the location, but it was next to a dead body and had a couple arrows next to it.

[Enigmaecho]

28 minutes ago, Merrak said:

The Sport Bow was down in the Mine. I can't remember the location, but it was next to a dead body and had a couple arrows next to it.

Oof… spelunking I go again 😂

[turtle777]

16 days in ZOC on Interloper, haven't found the darn Foreman's Key yet.

Explored the whole mine, all mine buildings, and most of the region. But must have missed that freaking key. Aargh.

Darn wolves are hard to deal with. It seems like torches are not guaranteed to work. I've been using blue flares, and so far, no issues with fending wolves off. But only have a few blue flares left, so gotta be really judicious.

Trying to survive 50 days in new zone, having brought nothing in. Food is going to be a challenge.

-t

[Merrak]

19 minutes ago, turtle777 said:

16 days in ZOC on Interloper, haven't found the darn Foreman's Key yet.

Explored the whole mine, all mine buildings, and most of the region. But must have missed that freaking key. Aargh.

Darn wolves are hard to deal with. It seems like torches are not guaranteed to work. I've been using blue flares, and so far, no issues with fending wolves off. But only have a few blue flares left, so gotta be really judicious.

Trying to survive 50 days in new zone, having brought nothing in. Food is going to be a challenge.

-t

Food isn't as scarce as it seems at first. There is a bear spawn and a few deer/rabbit spawns. One bear and a buck will last you a significant amount of time. You can travois a load of meat to a cave, cook it up, and bring it out as needed...or haul it back to wherever your safehaven is. You'll obviously need to contend with the devil spawn wolves to transport it...but fending them off isn't too much of a challenge.

Edit: Also, without spoiling anything, some things require the Buried Echoes quest to be advanced in order to do other things. This zone was built around the idea of you coming here after finishing Signal Void, so use that knowledge to lead you forward.

Edited December 9, 2023 by Merrak
contributing more to the convo

[Enigmaecho]

2 hours ago, Merrak said:

The Sport Bow was down in the Mine. I can't remember the location, but it was next to a dead body and had a couple arrows next to it.

 

Spoiler

Do you happen to remember if it was in the big dead end section with the “toxic gas” and elevator sign?

 

[Merrak]

6 minutes ago, Enigmaecho said:

  Hide contents

Do you happen to remember if it was in the big dead end section with the “toxic gas” and elevator sign?

Spoiler

I'm pretty sure it's on level 3, it's next to one of the downward sloping switchback rock ramps, if that helps.

 

Edited December 9, 2023 by Merrak
Trying to fix formatting

[Enigmaecho]

5 hours ago, Merrak said:

  Hide contents

I'm pretty sure it's on level 3, it's next to one of the downward sloping switchback rock ramps, if that helps.

 

Spoiler

Good looking out my friend, I had inadvertently completely missed floor two in the upper mine and all of the 300 Level in the lower it was right where you said 🫡

 

[hozz1235]

21 hours ago, Enigmaecho said:

Where’d you find a sport bow?

Spoiler

It was in the Miner's Footpath mine (which eventually leads to level 3 of the main mine.

 

Edited December 9, 2023 by hozz1235

[acada]

I must say I love/hate the Zone. Simply I hate the Zone undeground. I am no big fan of beeing undeground in the game generally (which is odd, because IRL I love caves and exploring them, but at that time I am not alone). In the game I dont want to loose my 280 day survivor to a gas. I accept to freeze, starve to death, be eaten by bear or wolf or rabbit when they realize the strength is in numbers, but to gas? No thank you.

As I can read you all drown in filters. I have found one respirator with one filter attached and one extra filter. From the protective clothing I have found trousers only. Where is the rest? I think I searched on the surface everywhere. The mine I only entered from the hopper and fled when suffocation risk appeared because of lack of filters.

As I wrote, I like the scenery but hate the atmosphere. All the acid spills, ill wolfes and the suffocating in mines... brrr. I dont want to spend more time than needed. Not sure if I ever return after this visit. My Astrid urges me to go back to Coastal Highway to do some sea fishing and leave the mystery in the mine.

[hozz1235]

I love the lightable lanterns in the mine.

[Kuldirongaze]

On 12/9/2023 at 12:45 PM, Enigmaecho said:

Where’d you find a sport bow?

I found a miners flashlight and I’m over to moon! Just need the foresters revolver that didn’t make it on my existing and I’ll have it all but I’d love another sport bow 

Past the part in the mine where you need the hatchet.

[Enigmaecho]

3 hours ago, Kuldirongaze said:

Past the part in the mine where you need the hatchet.

I got it off Merraks lead thanks 

Edited December 10, 2023 by Enigmaecho